Just Harry
by Von
Summary: Glimpses of 'Just Harry', Master(ed) of Death. No plot.
1. Chapter 1

This was originally posted over in my junk drawer but as it looks to be a complete-unless-something-unexpected-happens sort of story (and that page is getting crowded), I'm posting it to ff.n and marking it as done!

Suggestions and requests are welcome, but I'll only ever write something if a burst of inspiration happens.

_**Just Harry**_

"Hey"

Jessica looks up, cheeks wet with tears. Leaning against the foot of her bed, smiling at her, is a boy.

There's something different about him, she knows it right away without knowing _how_ she knows. He's not another patient, or visiting family. The nurses don't even look at him, and he's not _masked_, so they _should_ be shouting and ordering him out.

She wonders if he's an imaginary friend, like what she had when she was little. Just in case he is, she doesn't answer out loud, thinking instead _Hello_ in her head as clearly as she can.

He smiles a little wider, his eyes crinkling in a nice way, like they're sharing a joke.

He has black hair - black like Rei's, from school, but not so silky. It sticks up like her big brother is always trying to do, but doesn't look sticky or stiff like his hair does. He has pale skin - _really _pale - and she worries for a second that he might be a ghost, but she doesn't really think he is because his lips are a bit pink like hers and his eyes are so green she thinks he must be wearing coloured contacts - and _ghosts_ don't wear _contacts!_

The nurses smile at her too as they finish changing the sheets from under her and Jessica watches in amazement as one of them walks right _through_ the boy. He grimaces a bit then rolls his eyes and she giggles softly. As she waits for them to finish checking her machines and writing in her folder, she tilts her head to see if his legs fade away like Danny Phantom's sometimes do. But no, he's just got boring black boots on and boring black jeans along with his boring black shirt. He has a necklace but even that's boring - just some sort of black triangle/circle thing at the hollow of his throat, made out of that magnetic stone her Grammy used to try and fix her sickness with.

"You need some brighter colours." She informs him, the second the nurses leave the room. He grins at her, and hops up to sit by her feet.

"I do, huh?" He asks. His voice is nice too, kind of soft and warm and strong. He seems happy to see her, to talk to her, and people haven't been happy to do _that_ for a long, long time.

"What would you recommend?"

Jessica pretends to run a professional eye over him, just like the people on the fashion show she and her Mum watched at night time. She pretends he's one of the models for her world-famous designs, and she was figuring out how to perfectly accessorise the clothes she'd made for him to wear.

"You need green laces." She said authoritatively. "And, and green rings. But, different _kinds_ of green, like, apple and emerald and, and-" She broke off into a cough, long and deep and painful. From the corner of her eye she sees the nurse on watch look up from her spot in the observation cubby overlooking the isolation rooms. One of her machines must be sending an alert. The knowledge sends a little twist of fear through her and she coughs harder.

"Easy, sweetheart." A cool hand rubbed her back and she opened streaming eyes to see the boy's sympathetic green ones looking back. "Just relax."

"Who-who are you?" She wheezed, trying to distract herself from the catch in her lungs. It worked, sometimes. Her Mum and Dad were really good at distracting her until she felt better.

He smiled again, but this time it was a little sad.

"My name is Harry." He said simply. "I'm here to look after you."

Movement caught her eye and she looked up just in time to see another nurse join the first, staring hard at something on their desk before looking up directly at her. Both women had that tight, focused look they got sometimes, when Jessica got real sick or someone paged something grown-up over the speakers and they had to rush off.

"Am I dying?" She whispered fearfully. The cool hand at her back slid away and picked up her smaller, sweaty hand instead.

"…Yes." The boy said frankly, something serious in his eyes even as he stroked her hand with his thumb. "But you don't need to be scared. I'm here, for you. To take care of you."

"Will it hurt?" She cried a little, feeling sleepy and scared and now her own machines were making loud noises and the door was opening.

"Only a little." The boy comforted her. "You've already felt much worse. This'll be nothing - and then I'll take you to what comes next."

She squeezed her eyes shut, then snapped them open again. She didn't want to die! There were lots more people now, shouting and moving and sticking needles into her IV and leaning _through_ the boy - but they didn't seem as real as him, somehow. They were somehow quieter, further, less important.

"Hey." The boy said suddenly, distracting her just like her brother did. "Want a sneak peek?"

Before she could reply, the walls and floor and ceiling melted away. Her hospital bed and all the nurses and doctors were standing in a field of long, soft green grass - as high as her waist and waving in a soft breeze. Wildflowers she'd never seen before were nodding their beautiful heads and above them the sky was blue and gold and filled with rosy clouds and rainbows and flying horses.

She gasped in delight, eyes wide. Eager, but weary, she looked around. In every direction, something wonderful was waiting. Fairies flitted over a large outdoor picnic which was laid out with crystal dishes and food like she'd only ever seen in her story books. Waterfalls and floating cities shone in the distance. Tree-covered mountains curled welcomingly with all sorts of hidden nooks to explore. And everywhere, the air was fresh, the sun was warm, and everything was safe and healthy and happy.

She looked back up at the boy - at Harry - and squeezed his hand as hard as she could.

"I'll miss my family." She said, or maybe thought. He just smiled at her again, not sad anymore, just warm and comforting.

"No, you won't." She thought she heard him say, as the warm sun soothed her to sleep. "They'll be there waiting for you."

The tiny, fragile little girl with skin stretched painfully over brittle bones sighed softly as her soul slipped free from her body. The monitors attached to her still screamed in alarm, doctors and nurses still scrambled to recover her failing body but the little girl and her smiling, green-eyed guardian were gone.

_Just Harry_

And that was the new existence of 'Just Harry', the Master of Death.

Master had been an assumption, an arrogant one by those that had come before him. In truth, by bringing together the Hallows - by being _worthy_ - he was in reality mastered_ by _Death. _He_ served _it._ The phenomenon, the power, the _essence_ that balanced out life itself.

And yet, despite the fact that he had no power over it - he could not reverse death or stave it off or cause it to take someone before their time - he never quite _felt_ like a servant. Or a slave.

He just felt… at home. A part of something that was as much _himself_ as he was _it_. He served and was served in turn. He never felt commanded to do anything, only requested. Required. Reminded. He had but one job to do and it was one he did as easily as breathing because it was one _he wanted to do_.

And… it was a _good thing_. Sad, maybe, but he was learning that it didn't have to be. He was learning that his presence could be the moment when things got _better_ for his little charges.

He brought comfort, protection, guidance and reassurance. He made a scary transition a lot easier. Sometimes, when the kids were close enough or _believed _enough - not necessarily in him, just in _something_ watching over them - he could even start work before they were gone. Ease them free just a few vital moments earlier, make it not as painful and scary. He never took them before their time, no - he _couldn't_. But he could make a big difference, sometimes for _days_ before the final moment came.

And he never got tired of helping children cross the road, between life and death.

_**Just Harry**_


	2. Chapter 2

_**Just Harry**_

"Oh no, no no! C'mon, kid! Don't stop now, you're so _close_!"

Desperately, Jack Frost cast around for something, _anything_ he could do to stop the twelve-year-old runaway from freezing to death.

It was the dead of Winter and Jack _brought_ the cold, he couldn't take it away. All he could do was ask the Wind to leave ground level and travel high, whipping the clouds into a protective cover. He'd overheard someone once say that a clear night was coldest.

The clouds dulled the full moon, reducing the light the kid had been stumbling through, but the kid had stopped moving three minutes ago.

Stopped getting back up. Stopped crying.

It was only a matter of time before the boy, in a thin grubby jacket and sneakers, stopped breathing too.

The worst of it was that he was _so close_ to town. A ten minute walk at most! Jack had flown there and back several times already, looking for someone to throw a snowball at or a lit window to frost a cry for help on.

But his snowballs almost *never* hit adults. They just... lacked something. And all the lit windows melted his frost instantly, the heaters beneath them blasting away at full strength.

He'd tried to lead the kid, but a snowball had just knocked him down - his legs were so weak! - and he seemed blind to the frost lines that glowed thick under the moonlight. If the terrain weren't so broken, he'd have tried to force the kid to _slide_ home.

Surely even an angry home was better than dying scared and alone in the cold.

A shadow shifted and Jack whirled, _furious_, to punish Pitch for seeking to torment the poor kid in his last moments-

-only to stop dead, as a boy - a being - that looked almost like a mirror image of himself stepped out of the shadows instead.

The fleeting thought that this was some sort of trick was banished as he sensed the being, felt his nature even if he didn't quite understand it.

The skinny, black-haired, green-eyed being was like Jack. A part of the world, yet apart. And, like Jack, here to help, not hurt.

The boy blinked at him and smiled - oddly shy considering the inevitability of the force he represented. Jack wondered if _he_ was lonely too. Thought maybe he must be, if this was the first time Jack was seeing him.

Jak had seen a lot of people die from the cold, after all, even in this age of electricity and shelters. Never before had he seen this black-haired boy born of Death, just as he had been born of Winter.

The other teen didn't speak to Jack, though, stepping past him instead to kneel by the kid.

He reached out, skin almost as white as Jack's - bone white, not bloodless white - and poked the kid firmly on the shoulder.

"Up you get, Alex." The boy's accent was British, soft at the edges, and kind. "Come on, I've got a blanket with your name on it."

The kid stirred. His eyes cracked open. They closed. He stilled.

He sat up.

Jack gaped as the boy looked up at the black-haired being, either ignorant to or uncaring of the fact that he'd also _left his body behind_ in the snow.

The dark haired teen smiled, comfort and humour and security radiating from him the way cold radiated from Jack. A thick, woollen blanket appeared in his hand.

True to his word, it had 'Alexander McCarthy' embroidered on one side. The boy flicked it around the kid's - Alex's? - shoulders and tucked it in. By the way the kid nuzzled into it, it _felt_ warm, for all that Jack could tell - as a being of Cold - that the actual temperature in the area remained freezing.

"You've had a bit of a night, haven't you?" The boy murmured, sympathy without anxiety. One hand gently cupped the back of his head. "Don't worry, kiddo. Everything's going to be fine, starting right now."

Shyly, the twelve-year old slipped his hand from his blanket to reach for the being who was guiding him away from life. The black-haired boy took his hand with a wink and stood to his full height. Under his feet, before Jack's disbelieving eyes, the snow turned to sand - golden-white and smooth, not like Sandy's but like a tropical beach he'd only ever seen in pictures. 2000 miles inland, the surf broke. The air tasted of salt mixed with fresh fruit and in the distance, loving laughter. In the dead of night the sun shone bright and hot for one single second-

-and the world was dark again, and Jack was alone. Just him and his crook, the being of Winter, standing guard over the body of a child who'd died in his cold.

He should have felt afraid. He'd all but brushed shoulders with _Death_.

But... kneeling briefly to touch the boy, frosting over his body to protect it from scavengers until it could be discovered, he instead found himself feeling... glad.

Glad that there _was_ someone there for people when they died. There for the _children_, especially.

And hope, a duality that he would meet the other being again paired with the absolute hope that it would _never_ be under the same circumstances.

But, he was the Guardian of Joy - not Hope. He _knew_ there'd only be one way they'd meet again.

He sighed.

"Wind." He called, barely at speaking level. The wind, hovering obediently thousands of feet above him, came to curl around him instantly. It tugged and fretted, itching to pull him away from something that it couldn't comprehend.

"Take me home." Jack whispered.

And the Wind carried him, not to his lake but to a warm window, through which a different child lay sleeping. One who wasn't cold and _would_ wake up again.

_**Just Harry**_


End file.
